I would sorta argue that this is a completely reasonable position for a "union" to take. Their job is to advocate for the interests of the tenants, and tenants don't want to loose their parking. Their job isn't to advocate for what is best for ALL tenants, just their member tenants
I can see that argument but they are specifically fighting against the new tenants.
I also think they have a point regarding constructive eviction. This is LA, there are going to be people who, depending on where they work, would have to move out if they lost a place to store a car, even if they'd prefer to take viable public transit.
I think turning garage space into apartments is a good idea overall, but you shouldn't be able to do it while a tenant, who probably put down a substantial deposit and planned their life around living there with a car, is still living there.
Then you might wait decades to be able to convert all the spots. Seems bad to put housing into a decades long wait for this.
Why would you have to wait? Landlords take units off the market to renovate all the time. At minimum, landlords should have to return the deposit + provide some amount of relocation assistance if they're going to change the terms of the lease this dramatically.
There’s always a long tail of very long tenured tenants in almost any building.
You do get a rent reduction for the loss of parking.
Do these rules also apply? Seems like they would given an ADU requires modifying a structure's HVAC/plumbing/wiring. housing.lacity.gov/wp-content/u...
Constructive eviction is illegal within the City of LA, what usually happens is the landlord pays a tenant to leave, which has its own restrictions housing.lacity.gov/rental-prope...
I think there are usually laws in most places regarding how the tenant can be compensated if the landlord is going to do major renovations. I wonder if these renovations count under LA's code.
so they are behaving exactly like every other union and protecting their own while throwing potential members under the bus
Sir I am from the Rustbelt
You’re not wrong, but this is why I view a lot of tenant organizing as small c-conservative.
One thing I was thinking about is how other nonrprofits can have such ridiculous mission creep they destroy their orgs integrity like Surfrider fighting housing, Sunrise Movement come to mind. The Tenants Org can't even widen to talk about safe streets. They are so narrow it's ridiculous.
